Scientists at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) announced at a press conference in Germany on Wednesday that they spotted an Earth-like planet orbiting a nearby star.

The rocky planet, dubbed Proxima b, was found near the star Proxima Centauri, the closet star to our solar system and one of three in the Alpha Centauri system — where astrophysicists have long anticipated finding a planet that has water, which means it can support life.

The planet was found orbiting in the star’s “Goldilocks Zone” — a habitable area where temperatures aren’t so cold that water freezes, like Mars, but isn’t so hot that water evaporates, like Venus.

The Alpha Centauri system, discovered in 1915, is part of the Centaurus constellation and is so close that you can actually see its other two stars — Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B — in the night sky. Alpha Centauri A is the fourth-brightest star visible from Earth, excluding our own sun.

The relative sizes of a number of objects, including the three known members of the Alpha Centauri triple system. The sun and planet Jupiter are also shown for comparison.ESO

The proximity of the star system is what makes the new discovery so exciting for scientists. Currently, the closest known Earth-like planet, Wolf 1061c, is 14 light-years away. Proxima b is a little more than 4 light-years away, and while it would take 1,000 years or more to travel to, it’s close enough for scientists to study.

In January, Anglada-Escudé launched the Pale Red Dot campaign, an international project that let the public follow the efforts in confirming the existence of Proxima b. The campaign ended in April, when scientists combined their data with images collected from ESO observatories and telescopes. The momentous findings will be published in Nature on Aug. 25.

“Many exoplanets have been found and many more will be found,” Anglada-Escudé told eso.org. “But searching for the closest potential Earth-analogue and succeeding has been the experience of a lifetime for all of us.”